Irvine Unified: 30,000 students and growing

Irvine Unified School District is bigger than ever and growing faster than it has in decades.

At 1:27 p.m. Friday, the district enrolled its 30,000th student for the 2013-14 school year.

It was the first time the district's student population has surpassed that mark, and it got there by growing its enrollment by 961 students since the start of the 2012-13 school year. That boost is larger than any year-to-year increase over at least the past two decades.

The growth has been expected, though.

Last spring, the school district projected it could gain another 8,500 students by the start of the 2016-17 school year. To keep up with the influx, the district opened Jeffrey Trail Middle School this school year and plans to open six more schools by the end of 2020.

Irvine was ranked as the eighth fastest-growing city in the nation, according to data released by the U.S. Census Bureau in March.

The California Department of Finance estimated the population of Irvine was 231,117 as of January.